Bloodhound land speed record attempt relaunches under new ownership

The familiar blue and orange livery is gone, and the “doghouse” headquarters near the Bristol docks is no more, but team Bloodhound is once again preparing to visit the South African desert to break records. Now owned by Ian Warhurst, the founder and managing director of Barnsley-based automotive turbocharger manufacturer Melett, who is now Chief Executive of a new holding company called Grafton LSR Ltd, the project's headquarters has relocated to the University technical centre in Berkeley, Gloucestershire. The car is now red and white, which is expected to soon be joined by sponsors’ logos, and the core of the previous team has transferred over to the new organisation. The STEM outreach and education aspects of the programme will also be carried over to the new organisation.

Bloodhound’s driver, RAF Wing Commander Andy Green, and chief engineer Mark Chapman are on board with Warhurst, as is speed record-specialising aerodynamicist Ron Ayers, who worked on Bloodhound’s predecessors, Thrust SSC and Thrust 2, both LSR holders in their time. Also unchanged are the team’s intentions: following operational and logistics planning, it plans to take the car to Hakskeen Pan, a dry lake bed in South Africa, for high speed tests and then an attempt to break the current land speed record, 1227.985 km/h (763.035 mph), which was set by Andy Green in Thrust SSC in 1997. The team will return to headquarters to review the data gathered during high-speed testing and the record runs, undergo any necessary engineering and then go back to South Africa to attempt to hit the 1600 km/h (1000 mph) mark.